CHAPTER XXX
1821-1830
RECONSTRUCTION CONTINUED—NICHOLAS GARRY, THE DEPUTY GOVERNOR, COMES OUT TO REORGANIZE THE UNITED COMPANIES—MORE COLONISTS FROM SWITZERLAND—THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN BRIGADES—ROSS OF OKANOGAN.
RECONSTRUCTION CONTINUED—NICHOLAS GARRY, THE DEPUTY GOVERNOR, COMES OUT TO REORGANIZE THE UNITED COMPANIES—MORE COLONISTS FROM SWITZERLAND—THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN BRIGADES—ROSS OF OKANOGAN.
It fellto Nicholas Garry to come out and reorganize the united traders, because he chanced to be the only unmarried man on the Governing Committee. The task was not easy. Bitter hatreds must be harmonized. Indians must be conciliated. Fire-eaters must be transferred to new districts, where old animosities would be unknown. Williams, the swashbuckler governor, must be replaced by George Simpson, the tactful man of business. Necessarily, a great many officers must be displaced altogether from both the old Companies.
It was not desirable that Garry should come out with active partisans of either Company. Bethune and Simon McGillivray and Doctor McLoughlin—the Nor’Westers—and Colin Robertson, the Hudson’s Bay man, all arrived at Montreal by different routes and took passage to Fort William by differentcanoes. So eager were the partisans, Garry was met in New York by such well-known Nor’Westers as Judge Ogden, and such well-known Hudson’s Bay agents as Auddjo, the Company’s lawyer. Leaving Montreal, Garry proceeded up the Ottawa in a canoe followed by Robertson and Simon McGillivray—all bound for Fort William, where the partners would sign the deed of union and Garry re-arrange the positions of the officers. At Long Sault the canoes passed the house of Red River’s first governor—Miles MacDonell—now mentally a wreck from the terrible struggle. Frobisher dead of starvation, Selkirk of a broken heart, Sir Alexander MacKenzie of ills contracted through exposure in the wilds, Miles MacDonell out of his mind—men of both sides had paid a deadly toll for mistakes and wrongs. Ottawa City when Garry passed West, in 1821, consisted solely of Wright’s farm at Hull. At the Sault was David Thompson, surveying boundaries for the government. Then Garry’s canoe landed him safely at Fort William, where the deed of union was signed that extinguished the lawless glory of that famous place. Then with partners assembled, old enemies glaring at each other across the table, the tactful George Simpson doing his best to help to suppress the ill-concealed hatred of former rivals, both sides proceeded to distribute the officers.
“The comfortable districts were set aside for friends of the N. W. C.,” declared the discontented Robertson, failing to see that his very loyalty to the old Company stood in the way of his promotion. “It never occurred to the new concern that such men as John Clarke and Colin Robertson were in existence. One cannot but admire the staunchness of these old Northwest partners. They are parting from life-long friends. The N. W. C. have gained a complete victory for the best places. John George McTavish becomes superintendent of York. McLoughlin goes to the Columbia. I am to have Norway House. Mr. John Clarke, full of health and vigor, was represented as compelled to go to Montreal for his health for a time. Mr. Simpson, the new governor, who did such good work in Athabasca as clerk, felt a good deal hurt at the way Mr. Garry made the appointments. Simon McGillivray lost his temper again and again. Mr. Simpson is one of the most pleasant little men I have ever met. He is full of spirit, can see no difficulties and is ambition itself. He requires bridle more than spur.”
Appointments having been made, Garry proceeds west, pausing at Rainy Lake, at Winnipeg River and at Red River to meet the Indians in treaty and hear Simon McGillivray assure them they must now all obey the Hudson’s Bay Company. At all tradingplaces the fur posts are combined in one palisaded fort. At Red River, so bitter is the feeling, Garry decides both Hudson’s Bay and Northwest forts must be abandoned and a new one built slightly back from the forks of the river. This is named after himself—Fort Garry. Ten years have passed since Selkirk sent his first colonists to Red River, and Garry finds that the settlement numbers two hundred and twenty-one Scotch people on the west side of Red River; sixty-five De Meuron soldiers, who remained as farmers, on the east side of Red River, and one hundred and thirty-three retired Canadian fur traders. Of the four hundred and nineteen people, only one hundred and fifty-four are women. The De Meurons are dissatisfied. They will not marry Indian wives, and no others are to be had, so the De Meurons grow tired of their homeless, wifeless cabins and become somewhat noted in Kildonan for tavern brawls and midnight raids on the hen roosts. Also, cattle mysteriously disappear, of which the De Meurons offer the hides for sale.
Garry then hastens from Lake Winnipeg to York on Hudson Bay to meet the incoming ships and return on one of them to England. He is just in time at York to meet one hundred and seventy Swiss settlers brought out by Walter von Husser, a Swiss nobleman. Garry foresees exactly what afterward happens.Here are wives for the De Meuron soldiers, but he fears these comely Swiss girls will fare badly with “the lawless banditti De Meurons.” Garry’s fears were not realized. The West has a wonderful way of raising the status of women through sheer scarcity of femininity. The De Meurons were so glad to see the Swiss that the emigrants were welcomed to the soldiers’ lodges for the winter. But in another way the Swiss settlers did not fare well. They were nearly all artisans, unused to farming—clockmakers and cabinet workers and carvers, who found small service for their labors on Red River. The consequence was the majority abandoned Red River and moved down to Minnesota, squatting near the newly built military post—Fort Snelling, near what is nowSt.Paul. Thus Selkirk—all unwitting—had builded better than he dreamed—laying the foundation colonies of two western empires; for these Swiss were the first settlers in Minnesota, as distinguished from mere fur traders.St.Paul, it may be added, was in those days known as “Pig’s Eye,” from the uncanny countenance of a disreputable whiskey dealer there.
Let us follow some of the newly organized brigades to their hunting fields. John McLoughlin has been sent to Oregon. Born on October 19, 1784, atRiviere de Loup, on theSt.Lawrence, six feet three in stature, the doctor is comparatively a young man to rule the vast empire beyond the mountains, but exposure has given him an appearance of premature age, of premature gentleness. His long hair, white as snow, wins him the name among the Indians of “White Eagle,” and his manners have the benign pomp of a man sure of himself. Douglas of Stuart Lake, who has been with Fraser, accompanies him as second. A Doctor Barclay goes as physician. Tom McKay, McLoughlin’s stepson, son of the McKay of the MacKenzie voyages, is leader of the brigades. Scattered at the different forts, at Colville and Walla Walla and Okanogan, are many of Astor’s old men, many of David Thompson’s old brigades. When the war of 1812 closed, by treaty of 1818 Fort George is restored to the Americans; but there are no Americans on the field. The Nor’Westers continue at the fort till Governor Simpson and Dr. John McLoughlin come in 1824-5, and to avoid the baleful effects of skippers’ rum from passing ships, move headquarters up the Columbia on the north side opposite Willamette River, some ninety or one hundred miles from the sea. The new fort is called Vancouver. While treaty has restored Fort George to the Americans, it has not restored Oregon. Oregon is in dispute. For the present, England andthe United States agree “to joint occupancy,” the treaty in no way to affect the final question of ownership.
Sir James Douglas, Governor of the Hudson’s Bay Company in British Columbia.
Sir James Douglas, Governor of the Hudson’s Bay Company in British Columbia.
If Italy, Spain, France, Germany and Switzerland were united under one flag, if that flag had the mottoPro Pelle Cutem—“Skin for Skin”—and the mystic letters H. B. C.—Hudson’s Bay Company—it would give some idea of the size of the fur traders’ kingdom ruled by McLoughlin. At a bend in the Columbia on the north side, far enough from the coast to be away from the rivalry of Pacific schooners, near enough to be in touch with tidewater, stood the capital of the kingdom, Fort Vancouver. Spruce slabs half a foot thick, twenty feet high, sharp at both ends and in double rows, composed the walls. Great gates with brass hinges extending half way across the top and bottom beams, opened leaf-wise toward the river. On the northwest corner stood a bastion whose lower stories served as powder magazine and upper windows as look-out. Cannon bristled through the double palisades of the fort, and to one side of the main gate was the customary wicket through which goods could be exchanged for furs from the Indians. The big, two-story, timbered house in the center of the court was the residence of the Chief Factor. On both sides were storesand warehouses and fur presses and the bachelors’ quarters and the little log cabins, where lived the married trappers. Trim lawns decorated with little rockeries of cannon balls divided the different buildings, and in front of the Chief Factor’s residence on the top of a large flagpole there blew to the breeze the flag with the letters H. B. C.—sign that a brigade was coming in, or a brigade setting out; or a ship had been sighted; or it was Sunday and the flying flag was signal to the Indians there would be no trade, a flag custom on Sundays that has lasted to this day.
At the mouth of the Columbia, all that remained of Astor’s Fort Astoria and Lewis and Clarke’s Fort Clatsop was a moldering pile of rain-rotted logs with a little square-timbered hut where one lone Scotchman kept watch for incoming ships and possible wrecks. Eastward, where the Columbia takes its first bend was Walla Walla, under trader Pambrum; northward, where it takes a second bend, Okanogan under Ross; west, where it turns up into the Arrow Lakes of British Columbia, Fort Colville under Firman MacDonell; and half way between these two posts southward, Spokane House, founded by that John Clarke, who was with Robertson in Athabasca. These were the strongholds from which the Company ruled its transmontane kingdom, fivelittle fur posts, all except Spokane, close to the main river trail, the capitals and sub-capitals of an empire big as half Europe.
By right, the treaty of joint occupation had reference only to Washington and Oregon; but who was to prevent McLeod leading his brigade down the coast to California as far as Sacramento, or Ogden his brigade up the Snake as far as the Nevada deserts, or Ross his mountaineers through Washington and Idaho over the Bitter Root and Rocky Mountains to the buffalo plains of the Missouri in Montana? It was a no-man’s-land, where trappers might wander whither their beaver quest led, with no other law but what each man’s right arm was strong enough to enforce. Fish diet palled at Fort Vancouver. Buffalo meat was needed for the brigades. Up at Fort Okanogan was Alexander Ross, studying the language of the mountain Indians, leading a lonely existence “with no other company,” as he relates, “but my dog Weasel and the Bible.” A mid-winter express brought Ross orders to proceed over the mountains by way of Clarke’s Fork or Flathead River to the headwaters of the Missouri and Yellowstone and Big Horn. His hunting field was the very stamping ground of the most dangerous warriors among the Indians—the Blackfeet and Piegans and Crows. Yet if this express had ordered Ross tomarch down to Hell’s Gate and jump over the precipice into that cañon, he would have obeyed. A better man for the field could not have been chosen. Ross had come to the Pacific on John Jacob Astor’s first ship. He had been almost at once sent North to establish Fort Okanogan, where by studying the Indian languages during the long isolated winters, he soon became a proficient trader. He was both religious and scholarly, but either the intense loneliness of the life, or the danger of being among the Indians without a companion, drove him into marriage with a daughter of the Okanogans. This wife became one of the grand old ladies of the Red River Settlement, when Ross retired to Manitoba. Beaver must be sought as usual at the headwaters of the Missouri and the Yellowstone and the Big Horn; and to reach those headwaters for the spring hunt, Ross must do his buffalo hunting in mid-winter. The mountain passes must be traversed through bottomless depths of snow, for the climate was so mild no crust formed, and above the tree line in the cloud region was a fall—fall of snow almost continuous for the winter months till the precipices overhung with dangerous snow cornices of ponderous weight, and the cut-rocks were heaped into huge snow mushrooms. But Ross was no novice at snow work in the mountains. One of his first winters atOkanogan, he had become so desperately lonely that he decided to pay a three days’ visit to his next door neighbor at Spokane House, one hundred and fifty miles away. The country was rocky and the trail steep. Coming home the horses had fagged so completely climbing the last mountain that Ross and his Indian servants dismounted to beat the way up through the snow for the animals to follow. It was not easy work. Snow cornice broke under the weight, and down men and horses slithered in miniature avalanche. The soft crust of drift over rocks broke, plunging the path-makers in snow to their armpits, and all the while the way was zigzagging up till Ross and his Indians were blowing with heat like whales. First, pack straps came off, then gun cases, then coats and waistcoats to be hung on the saddle pommels. A sharp turn in the trail brought them suddenly on one of those high, bare Alpine meadows where Arctic storms sweep when flowers may be blooming in the valley. Before they could find their horses darkness and snow so completely hid everything Ross could only shout against the wind for the men to shift for themselves and let the horses run. Then he realized that he was without either coat or buffalo blanket. Luckily, a bewildered pack horse jammed against him in the whirl. Ross gripped the saddle straps, cut the pack ropes, threwoff the load, and leaped astride the saddle trees with no other blanket than the patch of wool that served as saddle cloth. Certain that he was near Okanogan, he rode like mad through the howling darkness, but the floundering broncho fagged in the drifts, and Ross became so numb he could not keep his seat. Dismounting, he tried to keep himself warm by walking, but was soon so exhausted he could only cling to the warm body of the horse. Tying the saddle cloth round his neck, he tried to dig a hole of shelter in the snow, but there, his feet became so cold, he had to take off his boots to keep from freezing, and passed the night in a frantic effort against the frost-sleep. In the morning he was too stiff to mount his horse. He had no strength to beat the wind, and had almost determined to kill his horse and crawl inside the body, when the storm began to lessen. To his relief, Okanogan House was only a short distance away. When trappers went out to rescue the Indians of the party, they found one horse dead, torn to pieces by the wolves. Ross knew mountain travel.
It was February 11, 1824, when Ross struck east from Cœur d’Alene Lake—the Lake of the Pointed Heart, so called from the sharp trading, like “an awl” of the Indians—to cross the mountains of Idaho and Montana for the buffalo plains. BetweenOkanogan and Spokane House, he had succeeded in mustering twelve Hudson’s Bay trappers, Iroquois most of them, with a few Canadians like Pierre and Goddin and Sylvaille. Of the freeman who roved the mountains, forty-three joined Ross’ brigade. In all, there were forty-five men, two hundred and six traps, sixty-two guns, including a large brass cannon, and two hundred and thirty horses. In a few days they were on Horse Prairie, where roved herds of wild, Spanish ponies, claimed by the Flatheads and valued at four beaver skins each. Passing travelers might seize these horses, but woe betide them if full value were not left in beaver skins. Without warning, the Flatheads would pursue and exact a scalp for each horse stolen. From the outset Ross had trouble with his men. They had first served under Astor, then under the Nor’Westers, and now were unsettled by the recent change of allegiance to Hudson’s Bay. Besides, General Ashley’s mountaineers, Pierre Chouteau’s trappers, had begun coming across the plains fromSt.Louis. For each beaver the American trader paid $5.00, where the Hudson’s Bay paid only $1.00 and $2.00. Ross’ trappers were dissatisfied. For the first month—the mid-winter month when all game is quiet—no beaver were seen. Snow storms met the marchers as they neared the mountains, and on the 13th ofFebruary Ross awakened to find that the Iroquois hunters under old Pierre had deserted. Mounting post haste, Ross pursued, overtook the seceders, and demanded the cause of their complaint. They complained that the price allowed for their furs was so small in proportion to the exorbitant advance on goods, that they were never able to pay debts, much less make money, and declared they would not risk their lives any more. Ross, himself, acknowledges that goods worth six pence were traded for beaver worth $5.00 in China. “The Iroquois declared Mr. Ogden last fall had promised they should be paid half in currency. I told them that promise would be performed. They grumbled and talked, and talked and grumbled, and at last consented to proceed. Thinks I to myself—isthisthe beginning?” Four days later, the first beaver was caught, but only the toes were left in the trap. Wolves had howled all night round the camp. To avoid future mutiny, Ross appointed three leaders, old Pierre at the head of the Iroquois; Montour of the Half-breeds and himself for the Company’s trappers, the three to meet each night and exchange the views of the camp. On February 23rd, the brigade struck into that defile of the mountains between the Rockies east and the Bitter Root west, along the trail from what is now from Butte and Missoula to De Smetand Kootenay. They had left Clarke’s Fork and were on Hell Gate River, “so named,” explains Ross, “from being frequented by war parties of roving Blackfeet.” While the brigade camped came a tinkle of dog bells over the snow, and eight Piegans appeared driving loaded dog sleds with provisions to trade in the Flathead country. Before Ross could stop them, his rascally Iroquois were out of the leather lodges with a whoop and flare of firearms and had stripped the poor Piegans naked, leaving not so much as a piece of fat on their sleighs. There was nothing for Ross to do but “pay treble the value of the trash” and invite the victims into his own lodge. As the Piegans were going off next day, he gave them a salute of honor from the brass gun, “just to show them,” he explains, “that it makes a noise.” Barely was this trouble past, when two Iroquois again deserted. After them on horseback rode Ross with old Pierre as lieutenant. “Partly by persuasion, and partly by force,” he relates, “we put them on horseback and brought them into camp before dark.”
It was necessary to reach the buffalo plains and get the store of pemmican before the spring hunt. Already it was March, and Ross found himself in a narrow mountain cañon three hundred miles from any post, the trail forward blocked by snow twelvefeet deep for twenty miles. No time for mutineers to plot. Daydawn to dark for a week, Ross sent his men forward to cut a way through the snow, the horses disappearing through the soft drifts altogether in their plunges, and the end of a week saw only three miles clear with a howling blizzard that filled up the trench as fast as the trappers could work. Ross kept his men too busy to think of turning back and sent forward a fresh relay of horses to stamp the way open. The end of another week saw eight miles clear, but storm kept the men idle in camp for a day, and that day worked the mischief with discipline. “John Grey, a turbulent Iroquois, came to my lodge as spokesman to inform me he and ten others had resolved to turn back. I asked himwhy? He said this delay would lose the spring hunt. Anyway, the Iroquois had not engaged to dig snow and make roads. I told him I was surprised to hear a good, quiet, honest fellow like he was utter such cowardly words. (God forgive me for the lie!) I said by going back they would loose the whole year’s hunt. A change in the weather any day now might allow us to begin hunting. It was dangerous for us to separate. John answered he was no slave to work in this way. I told him he was a freeman of good character and to be careful to keep his character good. (God forgive me. In my heart, I thoughtotherwise. I saw him in his true colors, a turbulent blackguard, a d—— rascal, a low trouble maker.) He said: ‘Fair words are all very well; but back I am going to go.’ I thought a moment. Then I said: ‘You are no stronger than other men. Stopped, you will be. I will stop you!’ He said he would like to see the man who could stop him. I said: ‘I can.’ Old Pierre interrupted by coming in and John went off cursing the Company, the brigade, the country, the day he came to it. If his party deserts, this trip will fail. So another day ends.”
The next day, not a soul would go to work. With the storm howling round the tepee as if it would tear the buffalo flaps away, the solitary white man sitting by the fire inside the lodge, knew the mutiny was spreading. Up and down the cañon roared the blizzard, booming down from the mountains for almost a week, the bitter North wind drifting, piling, packing in a wall of snow from end to end of the eight-mile trench that had been cleared. Watching the smoke curl up from the central fire to the tepee top, Ross though alone, could afford to smile. With that wall of snow behind, it would be just as hard to go back as to go forward. The storm was cutting off the mutineers’ retreat. That night as the fires were smoldering and the hobbled bronchos huddling about the lodge walls for shelter from the wind, afurious barking of dogs aroused camp and the shout of “enemies, enemies, Blackfeet,” brought the trappers dashing out muskets in hand. The fire inside a tepee is too good a target for attack. Outside, even in storm is safer, but the snow muffled forms emerging from the wooly darkness proved to be no enemies at all, but six friendly Nez Percés, who had come from the buffalo hunt across the mountains on snowshoes. Five days the journey had taken. They reported buffalo in plenty but the snow deeper farther down the cañon. Taking advantage of the diversion created, Ross sent for John, the mutineer, and offered to reduce his debt to the Company “if the intriguing scamp would hunt the hills for game to keep the camp in meat.” John disposed of, Ross called for thirty volunteers to go back over the mountain on snowshoes with the Nez Percés to the buffalo hunt. With thirty men across the mountains, there was no danger of the rest turning back. Storm was followed by thaw, that increased the pasturage for the horses, and sent the Indian women picking cranberries in the marshes, and set the snow-slides rumbling down the mountains like thunder. Birds were singing in the cañon, geese winging north overhead, but still the snow lay packed like a wedge in the pass, barring way for horses or cannon. “I feel anxious, very anxious at our long delay here,” writesRoss at the end of a month. “The people grumble much. That sly, deep dog of an Iroquois, Laurent, deserted camp to-day before I knew. A more headstrong, ill-designing set of rascals than form this camp, God never permitted together in the fur trade.” In a few weeks the buffalo hunters were back with store of meat, which the squaws began to pound into pemmican; but the sun glare had been so strong on the unsheltered slopes of the uplands that six of the hunters were led home snow-blind. This discouraged the freemen, fickle as children; and rebellion began to brew again. In vain, Ross called a council, and went from lodge to lodge, and urged, and ordered, and pleaded, and bribed. Not a man but Old Pierre, the Iroquois, would go to work to clear the road.
The nights were spent in gambling, the days in grumbling; and old Cadiac, a Half-breed, had made himself an Indian drum or tom-tom of buffalo skin stretched on bare hoops. John Grey, the rebel, had uncased his fiddle and was filing away all night to the Red River jig and native dances of Indian pow-wow. Ross proposed the camp should give a concert. A concert meant that a dram of liquor would go the rounds. Two or three lodges were thrown into one. Vanished into thin air the mutinous mood of the rebels. Hither came Cadiac with the tom-tomtomof the Indian drum! Hither John Grey, the Iroquois, scraping his fiddle strings with the glee of a Troubadour! Hither Half-breeds with concertinas, and shaggy hunters with Jews’ harps, and French Canadians with a fife! The night was danced away with such wild Western jigs as Hell Gate had never seen before and did not see again till the mountains resounded to the music halls of the tin-horn gamblers in the construction days of the railway. When morning came over the hills, Ross sprung his surprise. Whether the surprise was mixed with what cheered the French half-breeds’ inner man—he does not tell. With a whoop and hurrah, he proposed they all go down the pass and dig that snow out to the strains of John Grey’s fiddle! The sun was coming over the mountains. The hunters were happy as grown-up children. What did the old snow matter anyway? Off they went! John Grey, the arch-rebel, literally fiddling them through the mountains! But alas, four days later, when the novelty or spree had worn off, on the morning of April 14th, every man of the camp except seven, refused to go to work. However, it was the last mile of the blockade, and those seven cleared the way. “Thursday, April 15th. This day we passed the defile of the mountains after a most laborious journey both for man and beast. Long before daylight we were on the road, in orderto profit by the hardness of the crust before the thaw. From the bottom to the top of the mountains is about one and a half miles. On the one side is the source of the Flathead River, on the other of the Missouri. The latter creek runs south-southeast through the mountains till it joins a branch of the Missouri beyond Grand Prairie. For twelve miles, the road had been made through five feet of snow, but the wind had filled it up again. The last eight miles we had to force our way through snow gullies, swimming the horses through in plunges. At fourP. M.we encamped on the other side of the defile without accident. Distance to-day eighteen miles, though only a mile and a half as the crow flies. This delay has cost loss of one month. We encamp to make lodge poles for the rest of the journey.”
From the journals sent in by Ross to Hudson’s Bay House, it is hard to follow the exact itinerary of his movements for the next two months. Nor do the books, which he wrote of his life in the West, throw much light on thelocaleof his travels. Wherever there were beaver and buffalo, the brigade marched. One week, the men were spread out in different parties on the Three Forks of the Missouri. Another week, they were on the headwaters of the Yellowstone in the National Park of Wyoming. They did not go eastward beyond sight of the mountains,but swung back and forward between Montana and Wyoming. “Saturday—April 17th—proceeded to the main fork of the Missouri and set watch. It was on this flat prairie, four hundred Piegans last year attacked Firman McDonald’s brigade and killed a freeman named Thomas Anderson. As we are on dangerous ground, I have drawn up the following rules: (1) All hands raise camp together by call; (2) The camp to march close together. (3) No person to run ahead; (4) No person to set traps till all hands are camped; (5) No person to sleep out of camp. All agreed to these rules, but they were broken before night. Thursday, 22nd of April—thirty-five beaver taken last night, six feet left in the traps, twenty-five traps missing (dragged off by the beaver or stolen by the Indians). The freemen let their horses run. They will not take care of them.” And then poor Ross varies the formalities of his daily report by breaking out in these lines against his unruly followers:
“Loss and misfortune must be the lotWhen care and attention are wholly forgot.”
“Loss and misfortune must be the lotWhen care and attention are wholly forgot.”
“Loss and misfortune must be the lotWhen care and attention are wholly forgot.”
“Loss and misfortune must be the lot
When care and attention are wholly forgot.”
“That scamp of a Saulteaux Indian threatens to leave because I found fault with him for breaking the rules. If he dares, I will strip him naked, horses, blankets and clothes, to fare forth on the plain. Saturday 24th—We crossed beyond the BoilingFountains. The snow is knee-deep. Half the people are snow-blind from sun glare.”
Ross now swung west over the Bitter Root Mountains to Salmon River, following as far as I can tell, the path of the modern Oregon Short Line Railway from Salt Lake to the Northern Pacific. So has it always been in America. Not the bridge builder but the fur trader has been the pathfinder for the railway. On leaving the middle fork of the Missouri, he refers to one of those wilderness tragedies of which word comes down to latter day life like a ghost echo of some primordial warfare. “Passed a deserted Piegan camp of thirty-six lodges rendered immemorial as the place where ten Piegan murderers of our people were burnt to death. The road through the mountains from the Missouri to Salmon River is a Blackfoot Pass of a most dangerous sort for lurking enemies; and yet the freemen insist on going out in twos and twos. Three people slept out of camp by their traps. I had to threaten not to give a single ball to them if they did not obey rules; fifty-five beaver to-day.”
Ross now scattered his trappers from the valley of the Three Tetons north along the tributaries of the Snake in Idaho. One Sunday night—Ross always compelled his trappers to dress for Sunday and hold prayers—two French Canadian freemenran into camp with moccasins torn to shreds and a breathless story. Contrary to rules, they had wandered in quest of game forty miles away, sleeping wherever night found them, with no food but what they carried in a blanket on their backs. “On their way to our camp, they saw a smoke, and taking it for our people had advanced within pistol shot when behold, it proved to be a camp of Piegans. Wheeling, they had hardly time to take shelter among a few willows, when they were surrounded by armed warriors on horseback. Placing their own horses between themselves and the enemy, our two men squatted on the grass to conceal themselves. The Piegans advanced within five paces, capering and yelling, cock sure of their prey. The women had gathered to act a willing part, armed with lances. The two crept through mud and water out of sight and when night came escaped, abandoning horses, saddles, traps and all. They had traveled on foot after dark the entire distance, hiding by day.”
By June, Ross had a thousand beaver; but the Piegans had followed up the trail of the two escaping men. “Saturday, 19th—Had a fight. This morning when all hands were at their traps scattered by twos, and only ten men left in the camp, forty Blackfeet all mounted, descended on us at full speed. The trappers were so scattered, they could rendereach other no assistance and took to their heels among the brushwood, throwing beaver one way, traps another. Jacques and John Grey were pursued on the open plain. Seeing their horses could not save them, our two heroes wheeled and rode pell mell into the enemy. The Piegans asked them to exchange guns. They refused. The chief seized Jacques’ rifle, but Jacques jerked it free, saying in Piegan: ‘If you wish to kill us, kill us at once; but our guns you shall never get while we are alive.’ The Piegans smiled, shook hands, asked where the camp was, and ordered the men to lead the way to it. With pulses beating, Jacques and John advanced with the unwelcome guests to the camp, a distance of eight miles. A little before arriving, Jacques broke away at full speed from his captors whooping and yelling—‘Blackfeet! Blackfeet!’ In an instant, camp was in an uproar. Of the ten men in camp, eight rushed to save the horses. Myself and the other instantly pointed the big gun, lighted the match and sent the women away. The party hove in sight. Seeing John with them, restrained me from firing. I signaled them to pause. Our horses were then secured. I received the Indians coldly. All our people had time to reach camp and take up a position of defense. I invited the Indians to smoke. After dark, they entertained us to music and dancing,which we would gladly have dispensed with. All slept armed. In the morning I gave the Piegans presents and told them to be off and play no tricks as we would follow them and punish them. The big gun did it. Sixty-five beaver to-day.”
Moving down Snake River in October, Ross met a party of Americans from the Big Horn from Major Henry’s brigade ofSt.Louis. They had nine hundred beaver but would not sell to Ross. Ross reached Spokane House with about $18,000 of fur in November. Here he helped to fit out Peter Skene Ogden for that first trip of his to the Snake Country, of which there is no record except what Ross gives here. He says Ogden set out with one hundred and seventy-six men under him, and definitely counted on collecting 14,500 beaver. No doubt the St. Louis trappers that Ross left on the Snake were the men, who “relieved” Peter Skene of his furs, and it is interesting to note that at the priceSt.Louis traders paid for furs, $5.50 a beaver, those 14,500 Hudson’s Bay beaver would make the exact amount with which General Ashley retired from the Indian Country.
Notes to Chapter XXX.—The contents of this chapter are drawn (1) as to reorganization from Colin Robertson’s manuscript journal and Nicholas Garry’s Journal; (2) as to the Columbia, from Ross’ manuscript journals sent to H. B. C. House, London. Ross was the author of three well-known books on western life, but this journey is taken entire from his official report to H. B. C.—a daily record of some six hundred foolscap folios.
Notes to Chapter XXX.—The contents of this chapter are drawn (1) as to reorganization from Colin Robertson’s manuscript journal and Nicholas Garry’s Journal; (2) as to the Columbia, from Ross’ manuscript journals sent to H. B. C. House, London. Ross was the author of three well-known books on western life, but this journey is taken entire from his official report to H. B. C.—a daily record of some six hundred foolscap folios.